No Such Thing
by SaucyPirate
Summary: Erik the Unremarkable was an ordinary adventurer with a knack for running into the Dragonborn at the worst possible time. He didn't believe in fate, but what do they say about coincidence?
1. The Contract

He was offended she didn't recognize him.

"Helgen," Erik pleaded.

"Yes, I've been there," she replied, stalking him around the campfire.

"Bleak Falls Barrow," he pressed, reaching for his axe. Just in case, though if this came to a fight...

"Huh. Heard terrible things about that place." The girl unsheathed a Daedric dagger. Frost coated the enchanted blade and surrounded the black metal with white mist. By Talos- there was no fucking way. He didn't stand a chance, but he really didn't want it to end like this.

"Rorikstead, College of Winterhold, Solitude, Windhelm-"

"You're just listing random places-" She adjusted her grip on the weapon. Her other hand glowed a warm, mesmerizing green. Illusion magic- "It's a calm spell. Don't worry, you won't feel a thing. No fear, no pain."

"What- No! For fuck's sake, we're both members of the Thieves' Guild!"

This gave her a pause. The girl glared sharply, asking with her eyes, 'Then why haven't I heard of you?'

'Because you're incredibly dense!' He wanted to bellow, but didn't because he was not ready to get stabbed in the neck by an enchanted dagger.

"And I was at Dragonbridge when you killed-"

"Ssh!"

"We're the only two people here!"

"I heard the Dark Brotherhood was behind that," she said, apparently unconvinced of his sincerity and dead-set on denying everything.

"Is that what you're doing in Dawnstar? And why you're all the way out here in the middle of nowhere?"

This stopped her infernal pacing. "How do you know about the new sanctuary?"

"Delvin and I are on very friendly terms," Erik answered with a hint of a grin.

"Bastard. I should have a word with him."

"So you admit it."

"Admit what?"

Erik rolled his eyes. The Dragonborn was denser than a sack of dead mudcrabs.

"Are you here to kill me?" he pressed.

"Have you been following me?" She countered.

"Answer my question first."

"Fine. Yes, there is a contract, but if you're really a member of the guild…"

"I have not lied to you. Not once." Not that there would be a point.

"Then tell me the whole truth." She sheathed the dagger and leaned back against the wall of the cave, crossing her arms and balancing on one leg.

"It's a long story." Erik tried to make it look like he was casually taking a seat. In truth, his knees were too weak from relief to hold him up any longer.

"I had no other plans tonight."

The words 'besides killing you' hung in the air as if she said them aloud.

"Alright, where do I begin?"

"Tell me how you came to be at Helgen."


	2. The Stormcloak Camp

He wasn't with the Stormcloaks. Well, he was with the Stormcloaks, but not with them- just needed some armor repaired, and that particular camp was the closest place with a blacksmith.

"An Imperial," remarked the soot-covered blacksmith.

"Could be a spy," replied the bald Nord.

"A spy would have a better disguise. No, looks like this is the work of too much mead."

"Little too young to be having so much of that, don't you think?'

"Perhaps. Ulfric said-"

"Pardon me," Erik interrupted the two men.

"Who are you? A new recruit?"

Erik was a Nord. A Nord with no interest in petty politics and fickle allegiances, which made him an unusual Nord- but a Nord nonetheless. He opened his mouth to correct the smith-

"You're a big lad, but I'm sure we've got something to fit you. Light, medium or heavy?"

-And changed his mind. Why pay for repairs to an old, rusted, iron piece of shit when he could get some hot-from-the-forge steel for free?

"Heavy suits my style."

"Ah, a man after my own heart. Coming right up."

Erik crossed his arms, leaned back against a wooden post, and tried to avoid eye contact with the bald Stormcloak whose conversation he's interrupted. He didn't care for small talk or familiarity with people he planned to steal from.

The bald man didn't take the hint.

"Did you hear about the girl?" He didn't wait for an answer, "She wandered into camp last night and asked why king uncle Septim drank Spriggan Sap from a tusk o' a Horker, or some other nonsense. Could have been code. Sounded lucid and walked a straight line- so we took her to Ulfric for questioning…"

That last name sounded familiar. The bald man (whose name Erik also did not know, nor care to) said 'Ulfric' with a special reverence. Like everyone should know who that is, and especially a Stormcloak recruit.

Instead of saying "who's that," Eric opted for: "And?"

"And nothing. She took one look at him, giggled, and fainted. I think it might be a trick. Joren says there's no way- none of it makes any sense- but that might be exactly why she did it. To get us all turned around."

That was the stupidest fucking thing he ever heard.

"Makes sense," Erik lied.

"Doesn't it? Especially with that face. A strange look, like some sort of-"

"Here it is. Now, I didn't catch your name," the smith interrupted, armor in one hand and a list in the other. A list of names of actual recruits, Erik realized.

Well. It seemed a little too easy, but maybe he could push his luck.

"Erik."

The blacksmith hummed as he scanned the list, then aha-ed.

"Erik the Strong or Erik the Tall?"

It was a common name.

"Either one," Erik answered without thinking.

The smith gave him a strange look, then shrugged and thrust the armor at him.

"Welcome to the war, son. Best put this on right away. We're expecting an ambush."

Erik decided to find a cluster of shady trees under the pretense of wanting privacy. He should have bolted right away, but it had been so damn long since he wore something not reeking of old rust, dried sweat, and crusted blood. The steel was cold as ice, smooth as a mirror, and smelled like the first snow of a new winter. On the inside, it was soft and warm.

No, he wouldn't wait.

The instant the last plate clinked into place, the world flashed to grey, then faded to black…

"… Next thing I know, I'm on the back of a carriage, wedged between a barrel full of rotting apples and a really smelly Nord- not one of Ulfric's men, though. Heard ringing in one ear, like a screaming fly, and everything was-"

"Bright, blurry, far away," she finished for him, removing the bow from her back and unstrapping the quiver of arrows.

"Right. Exactly."

She sat down across from him and continued, "That was a year ago today. I was tired, thirsty and feeling, um..." dark eyes glazed over, refocused, "There was an Argonian who said she had just the thing. And she did."

Then it wasn't mead. Huh. So, that was her at the camp- the 'Imperial Spy' that drank too much (Skooma, from the sound of it) and fainted on Ulfric. Of course it was. Always her, always the same thing, no matter where he went.

The girl pulled her hood back from her face, hugged her knees to her chest, and gazed into the fire crackling between them.

Erik stared. Well, 'gaped' might be a better word.

The bald man at the Stormcloak encampment made note of her face. He didn't call her 'pretty,' or 'beautiful,' because this was something beyond simple appearance. She –this- was the smell of earth after the first spring rain, in human form. Clean, simple, and timeless. For some reason, though anyone who looked at her could see this (they had to, right?) none were shocked into silence like he was just then. As he was every other time, too.

Erik remembered the first time he saw that face. Lots of things changed since–by Talos, a whole year had gone by already!- but not this.

"Tell me."

"What?" he could feel himself flush, but didn't feel compelled to hid it.

"The rest of it. You have a remarkable memory."

Like he could forget about any of this if he wanted to.

"Right. So you remember- they dragged us off the wagons and lined us up like cattle…"


	3. Helgen

"Lokir of Rorikstead."

Erik realized belatedly that the Nord smelled like piss because he pissed himself out of fear. Luckily, Lokir appeared too underfed to have eaten enough to shit, or would probably be reeking of that too.

"Don't do it," he whispered, but… Yes, he ran. And they shot him.

Erik winced.

This was the end of the line, or close to it. He was behind a black-haired woman dressed in flimsy rags. The Imperial soldiers had a list, perhaps even the same list the smith checked for recruits in need of armor. Didn't seem to matter what was on it, though.

"Wait. You there, step forward. Who are you?"

"Rona." No title, no village, no family name.

"You're a long way from the Imperial City. What're you doing in Skyrim?" the soldier narrowed his eyes at this Rona, then turned to the woman beside him, "Captain, what should we do? She's not on the list."

"Forget the list. She goes to the block."

Another entry in a long, ever-growing list of Things That Just Didn't Make Sense to Erik: Why did the Imperials sentence the Imperial to death?

Erik identified himself to the soldiers as 'Erik,' resigned to his fate.

"Erik the Strong, or Erik the Tall?" Asked the Imperial man, scanning the list.

"Like it matters," answered Erik the Unremarkable, then turned toward the chopping block.

Blood, a box of severed heads, a pile of headless bodies, and the woman with black hair. No, not a woman. A girl. Her face was young, unscarred, unmarked. Dark, golden-brown skin, too smooth to have been colored by sunlight or windburn, glistened with sweat under the watery sun. She stood out like a green weed in a field of dry dirt and dead grass.

He stared.

She turned to him. Silvery blue met steely black, and though she looked, he doubted he saw him like he was seeing her.

The executioner pushed the girl to her knees.

"Don't," Erik wanted to shout, but couldn't because when she calmly rested her cheek on the filthy wood, the world tilted sideways. His feet were still on the ground and the stone tower upright and in sight, but a sudden fear roared in his chest like the cry of an ancient dragon. The executioner raised his axe. Erik realized, suddenly, senselessly, that the world would have no purpose without her in it.

It wasn't lust or delusion or infatuation –too soon for anything like that, regardless- just a simple truth he felt down to the marrow of his bones. They would all be lost without her, and he would be more lost than all the rest put together. Erik was dizzy, swaying, and more ready to lose his life than this. No, this was everything, and everything was about to end with a swing of the headsman's axe.

The moment shattered.

A real dragon, not the one he felt screaming in his fragile, mortal soul, shook the world upright. The executioner tumbled backwards. With a rumble of scorching thunder, everything burst into flames.

And Erik could breathe again. The fear was gone, as was the ridiculous notion that some skinny rag-clad Imperial girl was the focal point around which Mundus and all realms beyond revolved…

"…Then, I followed the rest of the Stormcloaks to a stone keep, past the dead Captain, through a torture chamber with a dead mage, dead Imperial-" he counted them off with his fingers "-and more dead soldiers from both sides…" Erik dropped his hand when he realized there were too many, and drew a deep breath before continuing, "So I waited out the battle in the cave, then waited a little longer. Everyone else was dead or gone by the time I moved forward. Took me a while to find the way out. There was also a dead bear. Someone had shot it clean through the eye."

His gaze landed on her bow, which buzzed and shimmered with shock magic and oozed the same mist as her dagger.

"Yes, that was me. Lucky shot-"

"Doubt it," he muttered.

"-But you lied."

Not this again.

"Like hell I did. After all this, you can't possibly-"

"When you said you didn't follow me."

Oh. That.

"I didn't know it was you."

Though it always was.

"Fair enough," she conceded.

"So…"

"Please continue."

Exasperated, he asked, "Still need to be convinced not to kill me?"

"I'm not going to kill you. I wouldn't, even if everything you're saying is a lie. I don't think I can, or you'd be dead already."

"What does that mean?"

"You think I'm dense," she remarked without accusation.

Erik opened his mouth to deny it or ask how the hell she knew, but something in Rona's look stopped him.

"While I find you to be… Transparent," she finished, and waited.

It wasn't an explanation, unless explanations were supposed to create more confusion and a thousand burning questions. Erik decided it was better not to press his luck, and tell her how he ended up at that god-forsaken crypt. Bleak Falls Barrow.


End file.
